Photo/Illutration Aichi prefectural police headquarters in Nagoya (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

NAGOYA—Police arrested two elementary school teachers who are accused of taking sneak photos and videos of girls’ underwear and sharing the images with an online group of several like-minded educators.

The two men are suspected of violating the law on punishing acts related to taking sexual photographs. They have both admitted to the allegations, Aichi prefectural police said June 24.

One suspect is a 42-year-old teacher at a public elementary school in Nagoya who lives in the city’s Tempaku Ward. The other is a 37-year-old teacher at a public elementary school in Yokohama who resides in the city’s Totsuka Ward.

According to the police department’s juvenile division, the two men took voyeuristic pictures of the two girls’ underwear seen through their shorts between September 2024 and February this year.

Both girls were under 13 years old.

The Nagoya teacher shared a still image in a group chat on a social networking site. The Yokohama teacher uploaded a video for the same group, police said.

The Nagoya teacher is believed to have taken the picture at a facility in Aichi Prefecture, while the Yokohama teacher’s video recording occurred at a facility in Kanagawa Prefecture.

Police quoted the Nagoya teacher as saying about the allegations, “There is no doubt about it.”

The Yokohama teacher told investigators, “I surely took pictures of the girl in her underwear and sent them to people in the group.”

Police said they are working to clarify the actual situation of the group and its members.

The group is believed to have consisted of elementary and junior high school teachers and managed by the Nagoya teacher, police said. All members showed a fondness for sexual images of very young girls.

In March, Aichi police arrested a teacher in his 30s who worked at a Nagoya municipal elementary school on suspicion of vandalism to property.

He is accused of having “deposited” bodily fluids on the backpack of a 15-year-old girl on a train station platform in the city’s Atsuta Ward.

The investigation revealed the teacher was a member of the social media group.

Police found about 70 videos and images shared among the group’s chat room, including girls changing their clothes and up-skirt shots.

There were also sexual images that appeared to be “deepfakes” using children’s head-and-shoulder photos.

Some of the images appeared to have been taken at schools, police said.

However, it is unclear if these schools are where the group members worked, police said.

(This article was written by Toshinari Takahashi and Shun Noguchi.)

Related News